


[slide]

by the_misfortune_teller



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Cinema!au, M/M, Mentions of Braeden and Malia - please see notes, Movie theater!au, Scott trying to play matchmaker, background Scira, human!AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-15
Updated: 2015-03-15
Packaged: 2018-03-18 01:36:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,506
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3551165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_misfortune_teller/pseuds/the_misfortune_teller
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>He’s worked at the movie theater for just over a year now and it’s probably the best job he’s ever had, although that’s not entirely a fair comparison when the only other jobs he’s ever had involved raking leaves for Mrs. Huckabee next door and doing some filing for his dad at the station. </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>He’s also had a crush on Derek for just over a year, ever since his first day at the theater when their overbearing and probably certifiably insane general manager, Bobby Finstock, had declared he didn’t have time to do Stiles’ induction and had palmed him off on Derek instead because he happened to be walking past the office. </i>
</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>
    <b># #</b>
  </p>
</div>Working at the movie theater alongside his crush is all getting a little too much for Stiles. It's just as well Scott, and his terrible matchmaking plans, are on hand to help out.
            </blockquote>





	[slide]

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DeCaStDe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeCaStDe/gifts).



> **Stalia/Draeden warning:**  
>  There is a very brief mention of Stalia and Malia Tate in this fic and a scene involving Braeden. I do not ship Stalia. No way, no how. However, in order for this fic to work the way I wanted to, it was necessary to include Malia. If Malia/Stalia is triggering for you, please don't tell me in the comments. Just don't read my fic. I fully understand that some people want nothing to do with that ship/her and would generally go out of my way to avoid fics with Malia in them when looking for something to read. Likewise, if you think Malia is amazing, or Stalia is your OTP, please don't bother telling me. There is nothing you can say that will change my opinion on her/them and I'd appreciate it if you kept your thoughts on the subject to yourself. 
> 
> Likewise, there is a scene involving Braeden/Draeden. I like Braeden as a character but am not overly keen on Draeden as a ship because I don't like the way either of them are portrayed in it. I do get that a lot of people are very anti-Braeden/Draeden though, and again, if that's the case for you, you might want to avoid this fic.
> 
> Other:  
> I haven't worked in a cinema (or movie theater, for you cool kids across the pond) for over 10 years now so I guess the projection side of things may have changed since then - if there's any boothmonkeys reading, apologies for any inaccuracies!

He's definitely lacing up the projector, if anyone asks. Lacing up and certainly not staring down into the theater below where Derek just so happens to be pushing a brush around the floor in a half hearted fashion. Definitely just lacing up. Absolutely.

It's criminally unfair, he thinks as he moves a little closer to the porthole, how good Derek's ass looks in the shitty cargo pants they all have to wear. Hell, he even makes the dorky baseball cap look good. Stiles' own baseball cap is…somewhere in the booth, unloved and abandoned. He bites his lip as down in the theater below, Derek leans over the back of a seat, the fabric of his pants going tight and highlighting that glorious ass.

Only the next minute, he's distracted from his leering by a sharp, stinging pain in the back of his head. It shocks him and he stumbles forward, smacking his forehead hard against the porthole. He doesn't even look to see if Derek's noticed, just drops down out of sight, leaning back against the wall. One of the plastic spools from the makeup table is rocking backwards and forwards on the floor besides him and he picks it up just as Scott stomps up to the projector and makes short work of finishing off the lacing up.

“Why don't you just nut up and ask him out?” Scott asks, exasperated, as Stiles spins the spool around his pointer finger. “Instead of – of ogling him all the time?”

“I don't _ogle_ him,” Stiles huffs, taking the hand Scott's holding out to him and letting him pull him to his feet. “I just mildly admire his ass from time to time.”

“Well admire some other time then or they’ll all be starting late.”

Scott heads back off up the booth, his arms spread wide to indicate all the shows that Stiles is putting in jeopardy with his ass admirations. Who even cares? It’s not like the theatre is even busy at four thirty on a Thursday afternoon. Stiles does the most sensible thing he can think of and whips the empty spool at Scott's back, feeling a distinct sense of disappointment when it goes wide and misses him by a mile, clattering against the wall instead.

“Loser.”

“Shut up.”

Between them, they get theaters five and six laced up and ready to go in no time while Scott provides Stiles with a non-stop litany of advice about what he should do about the Derek situation, apparently oblivious to being repeatedly told to shut up.

“What do you even know about anything anyway?” Stiles eventually snaps as he starts up the projector for theater six and steps out from beside it. “You’ve had a whopping three girlfriends your entire life.”

Scott's distracted from retorting by his cell chiming in his pocket; it’ll be Kira, one of the aforementioned three girlfriends. It’s always Kira. Texting Scott from downstairs so they can take their break together like the sickeningly sweet couple they are. Ugh. If Scott wasn’t his best friend, he’d find the whole thing entirely nauseating. As it is, he only finds it mildly nauseating.

“Kira?”

”Yep,” Scott replies as he removes his cap and tosses it onto the bench, a dopey grin spreading across his face. “I'll be back in a half hour.” He grabs his hoodie off the rack and makes a bee line for the back stairs, pausing when he reaches the door and pointing at Stiles, “And no more ogling!” before disappearing and leaving Stiles alone with the copy of As Above So Below he needs to get made up tonight ready for next Wednesday.

It’s one of his favorite things about the theater; that they still use proper film over digital projectors. There's something deeply satisfying about getting to splice together all the small rolls of film into one big reel and he suspects the repetitive nature of it appeals to his mind because of the level of concentration required looking out for flaws in the film stock. Scott laughs, calls him a perfectionist when they’re making up a film together, forever getting fed up with Stiles’ obsession with getting the ends of each reel lined up perfectly before he joins them. He leans over without looking up and cranks up the volume on the old CD player Boyd begrudgingly lets them play in the booth, lost to everything besides the music and the strip of film whizzing through his fingers.

“Are you OK?”

He jumps about eight feet off his stool at the sound of someone’s voice, unaware that anyone else was even in the booth and then flushes a brilliant shade of red, which he hopes is hidden somewhat by the low light, when he sees Derek standing a few feet away from the bench, the keys to the upstairs storeroom dangling from his hand.

“What?”

“Before?” Derek says slowly, like he’s talking to an idiot. “I thought – it looked like you hit your head.”

“Oh! Oh, yeah. That. You saw that?” Stiles replies with a nervous laugh, shoving his hand through his already messy hair. “I’m totally clumsy dude. You know, sometimes I’m surprised Boyd even agreed to let me work up here. Although maybe they think I’m less of a liability up here out of the way of customers, right? Did you see that time I –” He quickly realizes he’s babbling and sits down on his stool again, clamping his lips tightly together before he can tell Derek all the stupid things he’s ever done. Because let’s be honest, they’d be there a while if he did that and Derek probably wants to go home sometime instead of listening to his weird colleague rattling on about nothing.

Derek gives him a puzzled look for a moment before nodding towards the beat up CD player. “Black Keys, huh?”

“Yeah.”

_Yeah_. That’s all his idiotic brain can come up with as he desperately tries to think of something to say to Derek that isn’t ‘hey can I remind you of more ways in which I’m a giant spaz? Also, I’d quite like to lick your beard’. Why is Derek still standing there? It’s been that long since he’s worked a shift with Derek that he’s forgotten that this is how he amuses himself. By watching people get bewildered by how ridiculously attractive he is.

Thankfully, he’s saved from anymore awkwardness by Scott bounding back through the door, his hair in disarray and the dopey grin from earlier even wider and possibly even dopier.

“Hey man,” He grins as he passes Derek and holds his fist out for Stiles to bump. “Bunch of us are going to Flannigans tonight,” Scott continues, completely oblivious to the big pink cloud of awkwardness floating around between Stiles and Derek. “Hey,” He adds, turning towards Derek, “You should come. Stiles could really use a wingman. Like _really_ use one.”

“ _Shut up_ ,” Stiles hisses.

“He does,” Scott continues as he flaps his hand at Stiles to shush him. “You could stop him from making terrible sex decisions for once.”

Derek pulls a face and glances in Stiles’ direction, like he’s going to be able to explain what the hell Scott is talking about.

“I mean, we’re all friends here, right?” Scott is saying. “And Stiles,” He throws his arm around Stiles’ shoulder as he talks. “I love you bro, but I can’t be there to save you every time.”

Sometimes Scott really makes him wish he had Alex Mack style powers and could liquidize himself and just slither away from situations like this. Because Derek never comes out to the bar with them. Correction, Derek hasn’t ever come out with them again since that one time he did actually come out with them and Erica had gotten bombed on Long Island iced teas and launched a pitcher of beer over him, allegedly by accident. And Scott asking him to come out with them, suggesting that Stiles needs a wingman, is just obvious and awkward and stupidly transparent. If it wasn’t for the time back in middle school when Scott made him laugh so hard he peed his pants in the middle of the cafeteria, this little encounter might just have topped his top five times Scott completely embarrassed him list.

Even staring down at the floor he knows Derek’s still glancing over at him and keeps his gaze fixed on the cracked corner of one tile, willing himself to at least develop psychic powers so he can tell Scott to shut the fuck up without making himself look any more pathetic.

“I – uh,” Derek starts, and in his peripheral vision, Stiles can see him shifting awkwardly where he’s standing, the toe of his sneaker squeaking against the tile floor. 

“No really,” Scott plows on, like some kind of unstoppable machine created solely to embarrass Stiles. “You know last time we all went out he hooked up with that girl from next door? The one with all the hair.”

  _Come on body_ , Stiles thinks as he scowls at the floor, _just liquefy yourself and make for the stairs_. Scott always makes these sort of things sound way worse than they were. Sure, he’d made out with Malia, with all the hair, hair that still seemed to smell like fries and the spray they used on the shoes no matter how much perfume she piled on, like she was going for the bowling-alley-meets-a-Hollister-store effect. Still, it was fun and her lip gloss had tasted like bubblegum when Stiles had pressed her up against the wall and gone in for a filthy kiss, only breaking away when he’d felt her nimble fingers fumbling with his belt buckle. She’d managed to flick open the button on his fly as well by the time he took a step back, like she’d been fully intent on giving him a handy J right there in the middle of the bar. And sure, he _might_ have had his hand _vaguely_ on her tit but goddamnit, there’s a difference between a cheeky grope and someone trying to get his dick out in public. Hell, it’s shit like that that’s left him with a _reputation_ with the people next door. Malia isn’t exactly the first person from the bowling alley who he’s fooled around with. Scott’s wrong though if he thinks she places anywhere on Stiles’ list of top five ill-advised hook ups; he’d enjoyed himself right up until the “no sense of public decency” part and he wouldn’t even consider her for the top fifteen.

“Malia?” Derek asks sharply, like he’s read Stiles’ mind. Stiles looks up suddenly, jerked out of his thoughts by the sound of Derek’s voice. There’s a complicated expression on his face and when he catches Stiles looking at him, his mouth goes a little thinner and tighter.

“That’s her,” Scott says with a enthusiastic nod. “She’s kind of –“

“My cousin,” Derek interjects flatly, cutting Scott off before he can finish whatever it was he’d been about to say. “She’s my baby cousin.” He looks away from Stiles and jangles the set of keys in his hand. “Look, thanks for the invite, but I think I’ll pass.”

With that, he’s gone, heading back towards the storeroom without so much of a backwards glance.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Stiles hisses the second Derek is out of sight. “What did you have to go and tell him that for?”

“How was I supposed to know hair-girl is his cousin?” Scott huffs, shrugging off his hoodie and throwing it in the general direction of the coat hooks: it misses and plops pathetically to the floor. “I was just trying to help.”

“Well don’t.”

“But –”

“Don’t talk to me,” Stiles grumbles as he turns back around to the makeup table, his shoulders hunched and his back to Scott. “I’m still mad at you.”

“Stiles –”

Stiles holds up his finger and makes a shushing noise, making a big show of focusing on the strip of film in front of him.

“I don’t know why you’re making such a big deal out of it,” Scott says, his words coming out in a rush like that’ll stop Stiles from cutting him off again. “He was looking pretty interested until you got all weird. Like he might actually come to the bar with us again.”

“You mean until you made it sound like I’d banged his cousin,” Stiles hisses back, acutely aware that Derek is still in the stockroom and could reappear in the booth at any second.

“ _Baby cousin_ ,” Scott laughs, mimicking Derek’s earlier words. Stiles scowls at him for a moment before flipping him off and stalking away down the booth to get the projector for theater nine started.

He’s officially revoking Scott’s status as his best friend.

**# #**

He’s worked at the movie theater for just over a year now and it’s probably the best job he’s ever had, although that’s not entirely a fair comparison when the only other jobs he’s ever had involved raking leaves for Mrs. Huckabee next door and doing some filing for his dad at the station.

He’s also had a crush on Derek for just over a year, ever since his first day at the theater when their overbearing and probably certifiably insane general manager, Bobby Finstock, had declared he didn’t have time to do Stiles’ induction and had palmed him off on Derek instead because he happened to be walking past the office.

Not that Stiles had minded even one tiny bit. Getting shown the ropes by Derek had meant getting to spend an entire morning trailing Derek around the movie theater, watching Derek as he leaned on the back of one of the seats, his tight black t-shirt showing off his biceps. Watching Derek as he’d stopped to talk to one of the supervisors in the staff room, stretching while he’d talked, his hands pressed against the low sloping ceiling so his shirt rode up and flashed the line of dark hair on his stomach. Watching Derek – hell, just generally watching Derek. He’s probably bordering on being a perv, but fuck it, he’s made his peace with that.

He’d had a lot of shifts with Derek for the first six months of his movie theater career, had spent a lot of those shifts continuing to subtly perv at Derek while finding out that Derek’s actually a pretty interesting person as well as being devastatingly good looking who totally shares his taste in movies and music and books and food and pretty much everything else, which had done nothing to help his enormous crush.

There was even that one time when he’d been on floor with Lydia, doodling on the floor sheet while she neatly tore tickets apart when he’d looked up to see a girl in the most impossibly tight jeans he’d ever seen leaning nearly all the way over the concession stand while she talked to Derek.

“That’s his girlfriend,” Lydia had whispered as she’d dug her elbow into his ribs. She’d had a slightly evil smile on her face as she’d told him. After all, his crush on Derek hadn’t ever been a massive secret once Scott had gotten wind of it and told people and Lydia had always enjoyed knowing people’s business and using it to make them squirm.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Lydia had replied, her high ponytail bobbing as she’d nodded enthusiastically. “Braeden. She works at the gym down the street. The nice one, not Daehler’s.”

“Why do you even know this stuff?” Stiles had huffed, scribbling all the more viciously on the sheet in front of him as he’d tried not to pay attention to the way Derek was also leaning over the concession stand, his hands cupping Braeden’s elbows and an actual lovesick grin on his face.

“Because I took her boxercise class last fall,” Lydia had replied in her favorite talking-to-an-idiot voice as she’d twitched the pen out of Stiles’ fingers and pushed him in the direction of the cleaning closet. “Two’s coming out. Your turn.”

He’d thought about protesting for a moment, about reminding Lydia that he’d cleaned the last three theaters and it was actually her turn when he’d glanced up to see Braeden and her ridiculous jeans leaning further over the counter and kissing Derek passionately in full view of the crowded foyer. That had been more than enough to sending him storming off to fetch the cleaning supplies, because anything was better than watching _that_.

Even _that_ hadn’t stopped him from crushing hopelessly on Derek. Because he’s just that pathetic.

And because he was, hell still is, just that pathetic, what it had made him do, was go out to the bar that night and get absolutely off his tits drunk before stumbling home with one of Mason’s friends, whose name he still isn’t entirely sure of to this day but it’s been too long now and actually asking Mason would be embarrassing. Like fucking some random stranger was all a big fuck you to Derek for daring to have a girlfriend and not know that Stiles has been crushing on him since he started working at the theater.

Not long after that, his shift patterns had gotten switched and he had always seemed to be finishing a brutal morning shift just as Derek started a late one or vice versa. Now he’s working in the projection booth, he’s lucky if he sees Derek one shift out of twenty.

**# #**

“Hey.”

Stiles twists around, pulling his head out of the cupboard and smiling awkwardly when he sees Derek counting his float out into the register beside his own.

“Uh, hi,” He pulls out the box of Milk Duds he’d been looking for and tosses it onto the counter. “I heard – I thought you were on box today.”

Derek glances across the large foyer, with its threadbare carpets and cracked vinyl benches, towards the box office. “Lydia wanted to trade,” He says with a shrug. Stiles follows his gaze and spots Lydia, baseball cap tossed aside as she braids her hair and chats animatedly to Kira. It’s not exactly surprising that Lydia would bully someone into trading with her; every time she works the concessions stand, she spend the entire time complaining about the way the popcorn butter makes everything greasy and stinks up her hair. Still, right now, he’d happily take Lydia’s complaining over an awkward six hours with Derek. He completes blames Boyd for this. He’s only supposed to do one shift downstairs a week and it always coincides with when Boyd’s working the booth. Like, he’s happy enough to have Stiles working up there as a projectionist but doesn’t want to actually have to deal with having Stiles be a physical presence in the booth when he’s there. He’s fairly certain Boyd doesn’t actually like him all that much.

“How was the bar?” Derek asks with apparent disinterest as Stiles starts re-filling the cabinet between them with Milk Duds. The damn cabinets are built into the counter and as Stiles pushes the candy down towards the glass, he tries to decide what he dislikes more about this little task; that the boxes of Milk Duds and cookie dough bites have to go different ways up to fit into the cabinet neatly or that being down on the floor re-filling the cabinet puts him roughly at eye level with Derek’s ass.

“Didn’t go,” Stiles shrugs, sneaking a quick glance at the aforementioned perfect ass. “I wasn’t really feeling it you know?”

“How come?”

“I don’t know,” Stiles mutters into the candy display cabinet. “I just wasn’t.” He’d be super grateful right now if Derek would just get off the whole topic of the bar because the more he thinks about it, the more he keeps flashing back to the conversation with Scott last night and the more he wants to tell Derek that nothing really happened with Malia, but he has no idea how to even vocalize that without making things even weirder and more awkward. _I didn’t bang your cousin_ doesn’t seem the best thing to say to anyone ever.

"You been watching Fargo?" Derek asks, leaning on his elbows and staring up at the TV screens on the far wall. They play the same damn forty minute DVD over and over again, and Stiles thinks that if he hears the Step Up trailer one more time he might lose it.

"Nah," He replies as he concentrates on trying to get his boxes of Milk Duds to line up in a perfectly neat row. "That hobbit dude's face _bothers_ me."

He can feel Derek staring at him for a moment and continues fussing with the boxes of candy.

"That's the dumbest reason not to watch something I've ever heard," Derek snorts derisively.

Stiles shrugs as he stands up, brushing his hands against his apron. "Well that's my reason," he tells Derek. "Anyway, I just think you shouldn't fuck with the classics, you know? Fargo will always mean William H. Macy to me."

"They can do what they want as long as they don't mess with Miller's Crossing," Derek replies. " _That's_ a classic."

"It's not one of their best."

Derek scoffs at him, grabbing the empty Milk Duds box Stiles has left on the floor and pulling it apart. "So what is, in your oh so high and mighty opinion?"

"Top five Coen brothers’ films?" Stiles asks, perking up. That'll definitely stop him from blurting shit out about Malia.

"Sure, Rob Gordon, if you must."

Stiles grins, happy that Derek gets the reference. Scott needs reminding every time. So much so that Stiles is thinking of compiling a "top 5 times Scott failed to get the High Fidelity reference" list. Number one: while they were _watching the actual film_.

"Ok," He says after a minutes thought, talking the flattened cardboard from Derek and shoving it in the trash. "Number one: No Country for Old Men. Number two: The Big –" he ignores the small tutting noise Derek makes and carries on "number two: Big Lebowski. Number three: Fargo. Number four: O Brother Where Art Thou. Number five: Barton Fink."

"Ok," Derek starts, drumming his fingernails against the Formica countertop. "I'll give you most of those, but The Big Lebowski? It's overrated. Where's Miller's Crossing? Where's Raising Arizona?"

Their discussion is quickly cut off by a small crowd of people arriving for the next show and they both have to slope off and pretend to do some work for a few minutes.

"You're probably one of those weird people that really liked Intolerable Cruelty," Stiles hisses to Derek as they both lean over the salted popcorn bin, under filing the bags just enough to be unnoticeable by most customers, the way company policy dictates.

Derek doesn't say anything, but a few minutes later, when Stiles is fighting with the coffee machine, a chunk of ice slides down the back of his shirt which he's going to take as Derek's response to that suggestion.

He’s not really that bothered by the cold, wet sensation anyway. Not when the back of his neck feels like it’s on fire from where Derek’s fingers have brushed against his skin.

**# #**

"Stilinski!" Bobby barks as he raps his knuckles against the counter, completely oblivious to the fact that Stiles is with a customer. "Need you to stay and help close up. Jared called in sick."

With that, he's gone, strutting off across the foyer like a proud chicken; Stiles' customer flashes him a sympathetic smile, like he totally gets Stiles' pain. Bullshit. Nobody who comes to watch a movie at 2pm on a Friday afternoon has any concept of horrible bosses and most certainly does not get his pain.

"Yeah, no, that's fine," Stiles mutters under his breath as he slams the register drawer, "don't bother actually asking me or anything. Not like I might have had other plans. Not like I've been on since eleven this morning and could do with not being here for fourteen hours."

"Why don't you just go tell him you can't do it?" Derek asks, his voice doing that thing where he sounds like he’s talking to a chimp. A very stupid chimp.

"Because I could really use the money," Stiles replies with a sigh. "It'd just be nice to be asked instead of told one of these days, you know?"

Derek shrugs and turns his attention to the customer loitering in front of the counter. Derek probably _doesn't_ know, Stiles thinks, sneaking a sideways glance as Derek leans over the popcorn bin, because Derek has always had that vaguely threatening look going on and Bobby's probably scared of him.

"Why does he never talk to you like that?" Stiles continues as Derek tells his customer to enjoy her movie in an entirely unconvincing tone and gets an actual leering _wink_ in return.

"Because I don't take his shit?" Derek suggests with a shrug, leaning back on the counter again.

"Maybe I wouldn't have to take his shit if I looked like I murdered people in my spare time," Stiles muses, dancing out of the way when Derek throws a handful of ice at him.

They shoot the shit for a few hours while Stiles finishes restocking the candy displays and the bottled drinks fridge and Derek makes up trays of nachos; he probably speaks to Derek more in those couple of hours than he has in the last couple of months and they're in the middle of arguing over their top five Scorsese movies, because Derek, like an uneducated moron, won't accept that Goodfellas is superior to Taxi Driver when Greenberg starts his shift and tries to join in, interrupting them and spending a painfully awkward ten minutes telling them all about the newest episode of My Little fucking Pony he's been watching. And then Derek just up and walks away, leaving Stiles to deal with this new level of creepiness all by himself.

"You're a dick," he tells Derek firmly when they have another burst of customers and he has an ironclad excuse to scuttle away from Greenberg and his desire to talk about little cartoon horses.

Derek shrugs, glancing over towards the box office and then catching the eye of Jordan, one of the supervisors, where he's covering the drop box in front of the doors to the theaters.

"Hey, is this it?" He calls, gesturing to himself and Stiles. "You seen that queue?

"Sorry man," Jordan replies in a pretty unapologetic tone, "it's just the three of you. Jared's out sick and I need Mason to cover floor."

He gives Derek a what-can-i-do-shrug and goes back to taking tickets, leaving Derek looking like he might actually murder someone.

Hopefully he’ll pick Greenberg as his next victim and not Stiles.

**# #**

The next couple of hours pass in a hot, dizzying, butter scented blur. Greenberg gets relegated to working the Baskin Robbins stand after he drops, in quick succession, two jumbo drinks, a tray of nachos and a hotdog. Hardly anyone wants ice cream so he's less of a hazard there.

"What I don't get," Stiles says in an undertone as he fills two bags of popcorn for Derek, "is why we get stuck with chucklefuck over there when Mason, who's actually able to grasp the concept of holding on to things is busy pushing a brush around the theaters."

"Who would you want to spend your night talking to if you were Jordan?" Derek asks, taking the popcorn from Stiles and adding it to the pile of food between him and his customer.

"Good point. Hey, you should be extra grateful then."

"For what?"

"That Bobby railroaded me into staying, otherwise it'd just be you and the brony right now."

Derek snorts and flicks a stray piece of popcorn at Stiles. "Don't kid yourself. You're not much better."

**# #**  
  
Things have finally gone quiet when Scott comes skidding up to the concessions stand, his hoodie half pulled on over his uniform. Management have a real issue with them being in uniform on the floor during breaks.

"Dude!" He calls, beckoning Stiles away from where he's cleaning up the hot fudge sauce Greenberg slopped all across the back counter and didn't bother cleaning up before he left. "Dude, I need you to do me a favor."

"What favor?"

Scott looks shifty for a moment as he finishes pulling on his hoodie. "Print preview on Happy Feet needs doing for kids club tomorrow and I don't have time and I was kind of wondering if you might be able to do it?" He gives Stiles his best puppy dog eyes and dopey grin, rearranging the leaflets on the end of the counter while he waits for a reply.

"Dude, no! I've been here since eleven am _and_ King Dickbag is making me stay until close. What's so important that you can't do it?"

Scott shrugs, his shifty expression returning and that pretty much confirms Stiles' suspicions. "Great. So you get to go have sex and I get to spend my precious spare time watching singing penguins?"

“Some of them dance too,” Scott tells him helpfully before catching the annoyed expression on his face. "Please Stiles. I – me and Kira – we haven't, you know, for ages."

Stiles looks him up and down for a second and frowns. "So why do you have that stupid look on your face and your fly hanging open? That’s a ‘I just got a hummer’ grin." He smirks as Scott turns away and messes with his pants, his ears going red. "I'll do it, but you owe me big time. _Big_ with a capital b time. Especially after –" he glances around to see where Derek is, and only continues when he spots him at the far end of the counter, apathetically dragging a cloth across the surface while he talks to Lydia. "Especially after your little stunt with _him_ yesterday. You're still not forgiven, you know."

"I'll do your downstairs shifts for the next two weeks then," Scott grins. "Mow your dad’s lawn for you. Anything. You're a fucking star, man. I love you!"

"Go away," Stiles says playfully, flicking the end of his damp cloth at Scott. "Go away and have your filthy, nasty sex while I do all your work like the sad, unloved celibate loser I am. Asshole."

Scott laughs at that and tosses him the keys to the booth, promising to Stiles that he'll totally make it up to him. Stiles wonders idly if he's making up for the print preview, for the _thing_ with Derek yesterday or both.

"Make what up to you?" Derek asks from further down the counter.

"Doesn't matter," Stiles calls back. "Just dumb stuff."

**# #**

He's wandering down the corridor towards theater four when the door to the men's locker room swings open and Derek appears in the dimly lit corridor.

Stiles certainly _does not_ make a noise like a terrified goat and absolutely does not drop his big bag o' snacks from the convenience store down the street all over the floor.

"You trying to kill me?" He grouses as he drops to his knees and gathers up his colorful packets of assorted sugars and trans-fats. "What the hell are you still doing here?"

"Scott said you might want some help previewing whatever it is you’re previewing."

"Happy Feet," Stiles tells him, freeing a Red Vine from its packet and shoving it in the side of his mouth as he watches a frown that flicker across Derek's brow. He's not sure what's worse; Scott inadvertently blurting out in front of Derek that Stiles had felt up his cousin or Scott playing _fucking matchmaker_ via a penguin movie. "You've still got the option of backing out."  
  
"Can't," Derek replies offhandedly as he shoves his hand into his pocket and rattles what sounds like a big bunch of keys. "Bobby bribed me into locking the place up. I'm stuck here until you're done."

"Oh. Sorry."

"It's cool," Derek says with a shrug. "Unless you want to watch it by yourself?"

Stiles snorts at that and thrusts his big bag of snacks at Derek. "Hold that and I'll go get it started. We're in theater four."

Derek nods and starts poking through Stiles' grocery bag. "All this for one film?"

"I get bored."

"You'll get fat."

Stiles shrugs. He won't, he knows that, because even though he doesn’t really work out, he does spend what seems like his entire life fidgeting and twitching and that alone seems to keep the weight off. "Haven't yet," he adds, yanking up his t-shirt without thinking and flashing his stomach at Derek. Derek just fixes him with an oddly neutral expression that still manages to convey a sense of “I am wholly unimpressed with you and your ridiculous shenanigans” so he quickly lets go of his shirt and spins on his heel, making for the stairs up to the projection booth.

**# #**

"So," Derek says as Stiles sits down, leaving an empty seat between them.

"So what?"

"What are your top five penguin movies?" Derek asks with a small smile, dropping Stiles' bag of food at his feet.

"Huh," Stiles muses as he starts filling in the top of the preview sheet in his scratchy, messy handwriting. "Gimme a minute."

"Can I?" Derek asks, gesturing to the bag on the floor between them. Stiles nods while he sucks on the end on his pen, mulling over Derek's question.

"OK, number one, The Wrong Trousers," he starts.

"The British claymation? That wasn't about penguins."

"There was a penguin in it," Stiles argues. "Ergo, penguin movie."

“Chicken.”

“Penguin.”

“Chicken.”

“ _Yeah_ , dressed as a penguin.”

"I bet you're one of those people that claim Die Hard is a Christmas movie too," Derek snorts derisively as he sinks lower in his seat.

"Die Hard _is_ a Christmas movie. It’s the ultimate Christmas movie. But that's not the point. Number two penguin movie, March of the Penguins. Number three: Batman Returns," he holds up a finger when Derek pulls a face. "Featuring Danny DeVito as _The Penguin_. Number four: Madagascar. Number five - uh, number five," he gnaws on his pen for a moment. "You know what? This is too hard. There's not enough movies featuring penguins."

"Fight Club?" Derek suggests. "Slide."

"Fuck!" Stiles exclaims, dropping his clip board and unopened packet of Cheetos to the floor. "How'd I miss that one?"

He leans over to retrieve the board, groping around under the seat for his pen and hoping desperately that he doesn't end up putting his hand in something gross and sticky. When he sits back up, Derek has moved and is sat in the seat right beside him, making slightly more of a show than necessary about opening a packet of peanut butter m&ms and wedging them in the cup holder between the two of them. He must be pulling a weird face or something because Derek looks awkward for a moment before muttering about how he thought Stiles might drop something again.

Stiles shrugs and settles back in his seat, glancing up at the screen and watching Mumble's antics with disinterest. Now Derek's moved, their arms are touching and Stiles is desperately fighting down the urge to fidget which in reality is probably increasing his chances of clumsily elbowing Derek.

"Hey," he says suddenly, surprising himself almost as much of Derek with the sound of his voice. "So about what Scott said yesterday? About Malia. I just – I didn't sleep with her or anything, OK?"

He feels Derek stiffen beside him, and doesn't need to look at him to know he's frowning.

"He made it sound way worse than it was. I mean, we made out in a bar a bit. It was nothing else. It wasn't like I fucked her or anything," he bites his bottom lip hard to stop himself from saying anything else. He only has one cousin who he's not really very close with but he's pretty certain people don't like it when you talk about fucking their cousin. Or not fucking their cousin. Whatever. "I just thought you should know, OK?"

"Good," Derek says after an excruciatingly long pause. "That's – good."

And then, to Stiles’ infinite surprise, Derek shifts in his chair slightly and presses his knee against Stiles' own. Which is definitely not the response he'd been expecting. Even through their matching crappy cargo pants, Derek's knee feels warm against his and he pushes his own knee a little harder into Derek's to see if he's made a mistake. When Derek mimics the gesture, Stiles hurriedly grabs a handful of M&Ms, shoving them in his mouth to stop the smile that's threatening to spread across his face.

"Why didn't you?" Derek asks quietly.

"Huh? Why didn't I what?"

"Sleep with Malia. Sure, she’s my cousin and I love her, but I’ve known her her whole life and I know what she can be like when she’s been drinking. The offer was probably on the table."

"Oh," Stiles feels his cheeks flush at that and he grabs some more candy from the bag before answering. "Honestly? Because mostly I've got, um, kind of a reputation, I guess, with some of the people next door and I kind of didn't want that to continue."

"Reputation?" Derek asks, and now he's moved just a little bit in his chair so he's actually looking at Stiles.

"Yeah, you know," Stiles replies, a shade embarrassed. "They all think I'm like, I dunno, slutty movie theater kid or something. Like 'oh you're bored and want to get some? Stiles is good for that'."  
  
"And that's the only reason?"  
  
"No-o," Stiles says slowly, clicking his pen a few times while he debates whether he's really going to say what he wants to say or not. "No, I guess it was also because I have this sort of crush on someone."

"Yeah? Who?"

"I kind of get the feeling you already know," he says thickly; his tongue feels like it's swollen up to twice its usual size, presumably in a vain attempt to stop him from blurting shit like this out.

Derek does this weird shrug/nod combo and looks back at the screen, like a tap dancing cartoon penguin is far more interesting than what Stiles has just admitted. Stiles goes a little bit cold at that and slumps down further in his seat, moving his leg just enough that it's not touching Derek's anymore.

He nearly jumps out of his skin a few minutes later when, as he makes a note about a particular nasty emulsion scratch, he feels a hand rest on his leg, just above his knee.

Derek's hand. On his leg. Which is new.

He's not going to make a big deal out it. Nosiree, he's going to sit here watching these dumb penguins and pretend that is completely normal for Derek's hand to be on his leg. His plan's working fine initially; he shifts in his seat a little so he can press his knee up against Derek's again, because that seems to be the way this whole thing is going. The longer they sit like that, the more he wonders if he's supposed to try and hold Derek's hand or something.

"Oh," Derek comments drily as they both stare fixedly at the screen. "I was hoping the seal would eat him."

"I think," Stiles replies, swallowing hard when Derek's moves his hand again, letting it slip closer towards Stiles’ inner thigh and brushing his fingertips against the seam of his pants. "I think you probably can't call a movie _Happy_ Feet if the main penguin gets eaten by a seal."

"Yeah, you're probably right," Derek agrees, slowly walking his fingers further up the seam of Stiles' pants, like this is a completely normal situation for them to be in. Like he's totally unaware that he's the cause of the frankly debilitating boner Stiles is rocking right now. This might just be the only time he's ever been grateful for how thin his work pants are because even through the fabric, he can feel the drag of Derek's nails, although that’s having the slightly more negative effect of leaving literally no blood anywhere else in his body at this point because it’s all charging off to man his erection.

He gives up any pretence of trying to watch the movie and leans over to balance his clip board on the arm of a chair a few seats down. Now he's not holding anything he feels awkward and clumsy, like he had no idea what to do with his hands. He shifts in his chair again, trying to wriggle his pants a bit looser around his crotch. Trying to give his dick some breathing room. As he moves, he glances over at Derek, or more specifically, at the obvious bulge in Derek's pants. So, he's not the only one on vacation to bonertown. That's – encouraging. Encouraging and possibly a little scary because what the hell is Derek playing at?

As he looks up, he catches Derek's eye and decides to go for broke, sliding his hand across his lap and palming his aching dick through his pants, a small moan escaping from between his lips.

Derek makes a funny little strangled noise and slides his hand up a little further until Stiles' fingertips are brushing the back of his hand.

It's weird, how they're both not saying anything, how Derek's fingers are still twitching against the inside of his thigh. How they seem to have gone straight from shooting the shit to “please, feel free to have a go on my penis”. How this entire – whatever the hell this is – is going down while goddamn _Happy Feet_ plays in the background. It's a little surreal. There's a brief lull in the sound from the movie and in those few seconds, he hears Derek take a sharp inhale before moving his hand again, cupping and squeezing Stiles’ cock gently through his pants.

The noise he makes is probably bordering on obscene and he doesn't even care, just sinks lower in his chair and opens his legs a little wider as Derek keeps on stroking him lazily. Despite all his drunken, and yes OK, admittedly slutty antics when he's at the bar, he's never fooled around with someone at work before and the realization of how public what they're doing is, how if someone were to come in they'd have no illusions about what they're up to makes him even harder, and he feels his cock twitch against Derek's hand at the thought of it. The tiny part of his brain that's trying to maintain rational thought points out that they're the only ones left in the building and that there's no chance of anyone walking in on them. His dick clearly doesn't care about that though and just strains harder against his zipper.

What Derek's doing feels good, but it's driving him mad at the same time because what he really wants is, for preference, Derek's actual hand on his actual dick. Derek doesn't seem about to do that any time, just keeps groping and stroking Stiles in the what has to be the most torturously amazing way. He's about three seconds away from whipping his dick out right here and jacking off furiously because if he doesn't, Derek might actually make him go insane. He just about manages to restrain himself though, just in case jerking off at colleagues is considered rude. Even if said colleagues are the reason you need to jerk off more than you need air.

After what are possibly the _longest_ minutes in his life, Derek seems realize that he's about to make Stiles crack; crack or come in his pants, and still without looking, starts to fumble the button of Stiles' fly, popping it open before inching down his zipper. Even over the noise of the movie, the sound of metal teeth grating against each other still seems like the loudest sound in the world and Stiles only realizes he's holding his breath when Derek's fingers _finally_ slide inside his underwear and curl around his cock, jacking him a few times before twitching the waistband of Stiles’ underwear lower and finally, _finally_ , freeing his cock and starting to stroke him slowly but confidently.

"Fu-ck." The words are barely more than a whisper, but Derek still glances over at him anyway, a faint smile tugging at the corner of his mouth, like he knows exactly how mad he's making Stiles and plans to keep it up.

There could be actual real live penguins tap dancing around them for all Stiles cares right now, completely unable to focus on anything but the way Derek’s working his cock, all confident strokes with a little wrist twist thrown in at the end for good measure.

“This is really awkward,” Derek murmurs suddenly, his hand slipping off Stiles’ cock.

“Yeah, no, yeah, you’re probably right,” Stiles blurts out, sitting upright and hurriedly trying to tuck himself away, his eyes firmly fixed on the back of the seat in front of him. “I – sorry.”

“I, um, the angle,” Derek replies, shifting in his seat. “I mean the angle is awkward. Come on.” He stands up suddenly, grabbing Stiles’ hand and dragging him along the row of seats until they’re on the carpeted steps leading down to the front of the theater. It’s all Stiles can do to grab hold of the waistband of his pants to keep them from falling down around his ankles as he trails along behind Derek.

He doesn’t even have a chance to argue before Derek’s firmly but gently pushing him down onto the steps and tugging his pants and underwear lower as he drops to his knees between Stiles’ legs.

“You don’t –” Stiles starts to say as he props himself up on his elbows and stares at Derek. Before he gets a chance to finish his sentence, Derek’s lowering his head and dragging his tongue slowly up the underside of his cock. Stiles swears under his breath and flops backwards on the step, his arm across his face as Derek continues to torture him with his tongue. “Nope, you’re, fuck, you’re going to,” He murmurs, his free hand twisting into the fabric of his pants because what he really wants to do is tangle it into Derek’s hair but feels like that might be crossing some kind of line.

The movie might still be playing in the background, but the only sound Stiles is even slightly aware of is the greedy little moans that keep escaping from Derek’s mouth as he gives up on _licking_ and lowers his head, swallowing down several inches of Stiles’ cock and curling his fingers around the base simultaneously.

Stiles isn’t even a tiny bit ashamed to admit that there’s been a lot of blowjobs in his life but this one is definitely up there on the top five list. OK, so it’s not quite number one because probably nothing will top Heather and her sneaky little Altoid trick one but this is definitely a solid second place.

Derek’s gaze flicks up to meet his suddenly, and without stopping what he’s doing, he grabs hold of Stiles’ wrist and tugs gently until Stiles lets go of the bunched up fabric of his pants. To Stiles amazement, he guides Stiles’ hand towards his head and lets go of his wrist, nodding, at least as much as he’s able to with a dick in his mouth, when Stiles raises an eyebrow. Stiles gives it all of five seconds before he tangles his fingers into Derek’s hair and pulls lightly on it; he assumes Derek  must like it when he squeezes his thigh a little harder.

Maybe it’s because he’s been on edge ever since Derek switched seats and brushed his arm up against Stiles’ own or maybe because he’s got both hands tangled into Derek’s hair by now and has kind of been given carte blanche to fuck his mouth, Stiles isn’t sure but the one thing he is sure about is that it’s taken no time at all for him to get to the point where he’s about to blow. He pulls a little harder on Derek’s hair, like that’s any kind of warning and feels Derek’s fingernails digging hard into his inner thigh. That’s all too much for Stiles and he comes with a yell, arching his hips up as he spills down Derek’s throat. There’s a muffled little choking noise from Derek’s direction but that doesn’t seem to stop him swallowing what feels like every last drop.

 “It finished?” Stiles asks in surprise, peering over Derek’s shoulder as he sits back on his haunches and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. The end credits to the movie are rolling and he has absolutely no idea when that happened. “The movie, I mean,” He adds when Derek quirks an eyebrow at him and stands up.

“I guess,” Derek replies with a brief glance towards the screen before he looks back down at Stiles, an unreadable expression on his face. It’s only really then that it occurs to Stiles that maybe he should actually pull his pants up and put his dick away, because ‘sprawled on the stairs with his junk hanging out’ probably isn’t a great look for him.

Once he’s scrambled to his feet and grabbed his clipboard, with its blank sheet with absolutely no details about the quality of the movie whatsoever, he takes a step closer to Derek who hurriedly stops rubbing at the side of his jaw when he catches Stiles looking. The straining bulge in Derek’s pants is still patently obvious and Stiles moves a little closer still before tentatively reaching out and palming Derek’s dick, amazed by the way Derek’s eyes flutter shut as he does so and _oh god_ , he really, really wants to repay Derek the favor right this second. The dick favor.

“I – I uh need to shut off the projector,” He says instead, wanting to hit himself because he’s still got his hand on Derek’s dick and Derek’s kind of rocking into his touch and the booth is the last place he wants to be right now. “I mean, I don’t want to,” He continues as Derek’s eyes snap open. “But just give me ten minutes to shut down the booth and then we can – anything. We can go someplace and do whatever.”

Derek nods and steps to one side, laughing shortly when Stiles deliberately brushes up against him on his way past before bounding down the stairs and towards the door. As he rounds the corner, he notices Derek picking up all the trash they’ve left around their so recently abandoned seats and smiles to himself again, determined to get upstairs and get the booth closed down as quickly as humanly possible because holy shit, Derek Hale and his not entirely inconsiderable erection are going to be waiting downstairs for him.

He can’t seem to shake the amazed grin that’s spreading across his face, even when he slips on the stairs up to the booth and smacks his knee hard against the step in front of him.

Once he makes it upstairs and starts checking the projectors, he notices that for once, Scott’s actually properly closed down; everything’s switched off and all the platters, besides the ones for theater four, have their covers in place.

“I fucking love you, Scott McCall,” He laughs to himself as he shuts off projector four and grabs the platter covers from where they’re hanging beside it, tossing them over the empty platters.

"Stiles."

Stiles jumps at the sound of Derek's voice and looks over his shoulder to see him standing a few feet away next to the makeup bench, a serious expression on his face. He quickly tucks the end of the film under the reel before stepping away from the projector and closer to Derek. Derek’s not smiling and Stiles goes cold; Derek’s looking like he’s about to blurt out how everything that just happened was all a big mistake. Or, oh God, even worse, a joke. Do people give blow jobs as jokes? Dares? He probably would, actually. Does Derek?

"Yeah?"

"I – I uh, there was something I didn't do before," Derek says quietly.

"What's that?"

"This," Derek says, grabbing a handful of Stiles shirt and using his grip to pull him into a kiss. It’s a rough kiss, all desperate and needy as Derek presses him back against the wall. Derek’s mouth tastes like a weird combination of licorice and come. Stiles’ come. Which should be kind of gross but in actuality, is just getting him more turned on than he probably has any right to be.

“We could, um, go to your place?” Stiles suggests some time later when Derek lowers his head to nip at the side of Stiles’ neck. “I mean, if you want to.”

"Can't" Derek replies, his words muffled. "My parents are crazy light sleepers. They’d probably hear us."

Stiles frowns as he processes Derek's words before pulling back a little; " _You_ still live at home?"

"Sure," Derek says slowly, a hint of defensiveness in his tone. "What's wrong with that? Y _ou_ live at home, right?"

"Yeah, but I –" Stiles starts before he comes to his senses and wonders why exactly he's discussing the finer points of who lives where when he could be shoving his hands into Derek's back pockets again and grabbing at his ass. "You know what? Fuck it, I've got a car, you've got a car, we'll just – whatever," he waves his hand around in lieu of finishing his sentence before rolling his hips and grinding up against Derek.

It takes next to no time at all before they’re both panting and moaning into each other’s mouths, before Stiles is achingly hard again.

“Really want to fuck you,” Derek mumbles as Stiles nips at a patch of skin just below his ear. That sends a shiver of excitement straight to Stiles’ dick and he moans hungrily against Derek’s neck at the thought of it.

“Same.”

Derek makes a small noise of appreciation and rocks up against Stiles a little harder. “Really, really want to.”

“I –” Stiles starts, reaching down between the two of them and cupping Derek’s cock through his pants. “Gimme a minute?” He squeezes a little harder, enjoying the way Derek’s eyes flutter shut. Derek nods, his eyes still closed, a small whimpering noise slipping out from between his lips when Stiles steps away and goes to grab his bag from where it’s lurking on the other side of the bench.

As he digs past his Kindle and the other essential junk he keeps in his bag at all times, his fingers curling around the squidgy foil packets he’s looking for, he mentally thanks Mason for dragging him over to the safer sex stand that had been set up in the foyer at Jungle a few weeks ago. The two students in BHU shirts had paid them both five bucks to get a gonorrhea test and sent them away with handfuls of samples of lube and glow in the dark condoms. Which, score. And then the next day, he’d had a text telling him he didn’t have gonorrhea. Double score. He’d ditched the condoms pretty quickly because turns out, watching your own cock glow in the dark? Kind of creepy. But he’d stashed the lube in his bag for emergencies just like this one and lets out a pleased “Ah-ha!” as he turns round and waves the packets at Derek before tossing them onto the bench.

"You carry lube in your bag?" Derek asks, his tone a mixture of exasperation and amazement as he fingers one of the shiny packets Stiles as just dumped in front of him.

"I, uh. Yeah," he replies lamely, picking up the other packet and rolling it between his fingers. "Problem?" He can hear the edge of defiance in his voice and doesn't care because of Derek has a problem with him having lube in his bag, well then he should think twice about pressing people up against walls and kissing them and muttering about how he wants to fuck them.

Derek just shakes his head and drops the packet back on the bench, an  
amused look on his face. “No, definitely not a problem. C’mere.”

"Hang on," Stiles replies, throwing his own packet of lube onto the bench and digging in his bag again. "I'm just – shit!" He hurls his bag onto the floor in frustration and shoves his hands through his hair. "Fuck!"

"What's wrong?" Derek asks, his brow furrowing in confusion as he catches hold of Stiles' tee to stop him from storming away.

"I thought – god, this is so annoying. I thought I had condoms too," Stiles mumbles, trying to untangle Derek's fingers from his shirt. Because he really wants to pace right now. Derek doesn't seem to get that though, just moves his free hand to Stiles' hip and steps closer until he can rest his forehead against Stiles' own. “And not the creepy glowing ones. Regular ones.”

"Don’t worry about it," he says softly, punctuating the sentence with a kiss.

"Yeah but I want to," Stiles complains, the wheedling tone of his own voice making him wince. "Like really, really want to," he adds as he cants his hips towards Derek, grinning at the soft moan he gets in response.

“I said don’t worry about it,” Derek tells him as he tightens his hold on Stiles' hips and mimics his movements before he closes the gap between them and gives Stiles a bruising kiss.

He catches hold of the waistband of Derek's pants and pulls him closer, so they're flush against each other. That leaves Derek's hard cock pressed right up against his stomach, and as Stiles rolls his hips, Derek makes a frustrated whining noise in the back of his throat which just serves to remind Stiles that while he might have experienced what felt like some kind of religious experience in the theater downstairs, Derek hasn't had any form of – _relief_ and he grinds a little harder against him to hear him make those desperate noises again.

Which is how he ends up leaning back against the makeup bench with Derek rutting against his thigh, nipping and mouthing at Stiles' neck, the noises he's making gradually becoming more desperate. Stiles has tried a few times now to work his hand down between them, to free Derek's cock, but every time, Derek has distracted him with a filthy kiss and kept up what he's doing.

"I really think you should fuck me," Stiles blurts out as Derek's teeth graze the side of his throat. He feels Derek stiffen immediately and screws his eyes right shut so he doesn't have to look at him.

“OK.”

“OK?” Stiles repeats. “What about, you know, condoms?”

Derek steps back a little way and pulls his wallet out of his pocket, flipping it open and twitching out a solitary condom, it’s foil packet looking a little bit sad and worn like it’s been in there for a while now.

“You were holding out on me?” He asks in mock outrage as he grabs at Derek and pulls him close again so he can get back to the serious business of grinding up against him, not caring that he’s made Derek drop his wallet and the condom in the process. “What’s up with that?”

“Desperate and frustrated is a good look on you,” Derek tells him, a wicked grin flashing across his face as his disentangles himself from Stiles and stoops to grab the condom.

"You're probably right," Stiles nods unashamedly as Derek stands up again and he finally manages to get his hands on the flies of Derek's pants, fumbling them open and tugging them lower while Derek watches him intently, his pupils blown so wide, from either the low light of the booth or from lust, Stiles isn't sure. "But I kind of don't care about that right now. I kind of care more about how I really, really, _really_ want you to fuck me." As he says this, he slides his hands down the sides of Derek's boxer briefs and pushes them slowly down his hips, raising an appreciative eyebrow when Derek's cock springs free. "Really, really," he repeats as he tentatively reaches out and curls his hand around Derek's cock and gives him a few experimental strokes, grinning when Derek's head flops backwards and he groans.

"Me too."

Stiles swallows thickly and nods, lifting his arms so Derek has easier access to his pants. It takes him no time at all to get them unbuttoned, tugged low on his hips along with his underwear and at some point, Derek has spun them around and is leaning back against the makeup bench, his legs spread wide so Stiles can stand between them. As he leans in closer, feeling pretty damn stupid with his bare ass hanging out for all the world to see, Derek twists around and picks up one of the little packets of lube off the bench before tearing it open with his teeth and holding it up to Stiles.

"You sure?"

Stiles nods eagerly, watching Derek as he skillfully squeezes out a dollop of lube on to his fingers and smears it around, his eyes never leaving Stiles' as he does so. Stiles only becomes aware he's holding his breath when Derek reaches his arms around him and grabs at his ass with his thankfully lube free hand, pulling him closer. And then as Stiles relaxes into him, turning his head so he can nip at the side of Derek's throat rather than have his face smooshed against his shoulder, he feels the vaguely unpleasant feeling of a cold, lubed up finger tracing his rim. He hears the ridiculous noise that slips out of his mouth and pushes back against Derek's hand, hoping that will distract him from embarrassingly unmanly squeaks. Derek huffs against his ear and gives his ass cheek a squeeze before finally, _finally_ pressing his finger against Stiles' hole, and as he starts to work it inside, the embarrassing noise bubbles up again and Stiles resorts to attaching himself to Derek's neck like a limpet to stop _that_ happening again.

And the added bonus of that is that he can distract himself from being nervous over the fact that he's only ever bottomed twice in his life and only once which an actual guy with an actual penis. And both that guy, and the toy one of his kinkier ex girlfriends had used on him one time, were smaller than Derek. Stiles bites a little harder at Derek's collarbone and grinds up against him, his leaking cock sliding up the length of Derek's and drawing needy moans from both of them.

"Feels good," he murmurs against Derek's shoulder. That's kind of a lie, because it's a pretty awkward angle, and Derek's still only got one finger in him, his middle finger rubbing against Stiles' rim, like he's trying to encourage him to relax, but the fact that he's getting fingered by Derek in the middle of the projection booth is getting him more turned on than he can ever remember being in his life and that alone is sending shivers of pleasure up and down his spine.

"Yeah?" Derek asks in a low whisper, nudging at the side of Stiles' face until he lifts his head and kissing him softly. Stiles nods into the kiss, whining when Derek nips at his bottom lip. Presumably that's Derek's idea of a distraction technique, because the next thing Stiles knows, Derek's working in a second finger and he hears himself make some stupid noise into Derek's mouth at how good that feels.

It's not long before he starts to get impatient at just being fingered open, and starts pushing back greedily against Derek's hand, wanting, _needing_ , more.

"I think –" he tries, his words catching in his throat. "I think you should definitely fuck me now."

"I should?"

" _Yes_ ," he hisses, rocking up on the balls of his feet so their cocks brush against each other again because dear god, he needs some friction right now.

"How do you want –" Derek asks, trailing off towards the end of the sentence as he scissors his fingers, just catching Stiles' prostate with a fingertip. That really makes Stiles whimper and earns him a smug grin from Derek who pulls him closer and repeats the movement, more deliberate this time, and Stiles' legs start to tremble in response.

"You'll make me come," he grumbles, trying to twist away from Derek and his fingers-of-torture. "Just hurry up and fuck me."

Derek laughs shortly and gives him a rough kiss, slowly withdrawing his fingers as he does so. "Thought that was the point?"

"Yeah," Stiles pouts, taking a step backwards and unashamedly stroking his cock, because, well, he's _rock fucking hard_ and it's not like Derek seems to mind, given the way he's eyeing him appreciatively. "But when you're fucking me. You're not supposed to make me blow my load all up your shirt because –"

Derek cuts him off before he can say anything else, curling his hand around the back of Stiles' head and dragging him in for a kiss that leaves them both breathing heavily.

"So," Stiles pants when they break apart, "On the bench?" He knows he's flushing but doesn't care because Derek's got this look on his face, almost like he can't believe his luck, and hell yeah, Stiles is going to go with that.  
  
"Yeah, bench," Derek agrees as he steps to one side to let Stiles take his place, which Stiles wastes no time doing, spreading his legs wide to stop his pants sliding down around his ankles and resting his forearms on the Formica table top.

Leaning over the bench makes him feeling embarrassingly exposed, especially when Derek moves behind him and then doesn't do anything for a good few seconds, like he's just enjoying the view. He can hear Derek rolling on the condom and smearing his cock with lube, the slick noises sounding extra filthy in the quiet of the booth, and turns his head to glare at Derek over his shoulder. That earns him an embarrassed grin but does the trick because next thing he knows, Derek's are back tracing his rim before slipping, much more easily than before, inside of him. This time he goes straight for Stiles' prostate, rubbing his fingers in small circles against it and grabbing hold of Stiles' hip when he tries to squirm away, overwhelmed by the sensation.

"Dick. In me. Now," he snaps, glancing over his shoulder at Derek. There's a stifled snort of laughter behind him and then Derek's fingers disappearing, much less gently than before. He's about to complain about that when Derek slaps him lightly in the ass with a gross, lubey hand and steps closer, his feet between Stiles' own. And then, because Derek is evil and clearly doesn't want to just do as he's told, he traces Stiles' rim with the head of his cock like he thinks he's in a goddamn porno or something, smearing lube everywhere and making Stiles even more impatient because goddamn, that feels good but actually getting fucked would feel _even better_. After a few painfully long seconds, Derek stops teasing him and Stiles takes a deep breath as he feels the head of Derek's cock pressing against his hole a little more insistently than before.

He gasps loudly as Derek starts to push into him, the stretch more painful than he'd expected and to his horror, Derek immediately goes still behind him which makes things worse.

"Don't fucking stop," Stiles grits out, dropping his head onto his arm and biting down on his bottom lip. "It's fine, just, you're kinda, fuck, big. Move," he adds, the word coming out as almost a growl when Derek makes some weird little confused noise behind him. Thankfully, Derek seems to listen and starts to slowly move again, his hand moving up and down Stiles' back in a soothing motion as he does so. It still takes about six years before Derek finally bottoms out, going still again and sliding his hands under Stiles' shirt.

"Doing OK?" He asks, curling his fingers so they dig into Stiles' hips slightly. Stiles nods, mostly because he doesn't trust himself to talk right now, overwhelmed by how _full_ he feels, how wide Derek's cock is stretching him open, how much he wants to come _right the fuck now_.

Stiles is just getting to the point where he feels like he might be able to do something other than cling desperately to the bench when he feels Derek starting to pull out and whimpers pathetically, reaching back to grab at Derek’s hip in a bid to stop him. He hears Derek’s throaty laugh from behind, hears himself make an affronted noise when the head of Derek’s cock catches against his rim.

“Tease.”

Derek laughs again, and to Stiles’ annoyance, doesn’t immediately push all the way back in, just keeps tormenting him with shallow little thrusts that make Stiles whine.

“Stop dicking around,” He huffs out as he pinches Derek’s hip, “and just fuck me.”

“Yeah?” Derek asks quietly as he pushes back into Stiles in one quick thrust that seems to knock all the air out him. “Like this?” He snaps his hips forward, forcing Stiles to let go of him and grab for the bench again to steady himself.

“That’s more like it,” Stiles manages to grunt out as he braces himself against the desk so he can push back and match Derek’s thrusts.

The booth is surprisingly quiet when all of the projectors have been shut down so there’s nothing to drown out the filthy noises they’re making, the sound of skin slapping against skin, the way Derek’s making no attempt to stifle his moans. Not that Stiles is either; he’s very aware of the noises he’s making as Derek slams into him. Because Derek is not being particularly gentle right now and holy fuck, that feels good.

Presumably it feels good to Derek too, because his fingers are digging so hard into Stiles’ hips that he’s fairly certain he’s going to have bruises tomorrow. Over the sound of his own desperate moans, he can hear Derek muttering his name, hurriedly followed by “’m close” and “gonna come”. The noise Derek makes as he comes is too much for Stiles and he quickly follows suit, pulsing hot into his own hand as Derek drapes himself over his back and bites down hard on the side of his neck. And holy fuck, that just seems to make everything more intense because his cock twitches and spurts a fair few times more than usual, his heart pounding like he’s just run a marathon.

Derek’s oddly gentle as he pulls out, peppering the back of Stiles’ neck with kisses. That doesn’t stop Stiles from feeling disappointingly empty but it still feels _nice_ nevertheless.

“Hand me some of that blue roll?” He asks Derek, pulling a face at where come is starting to drip out from between his fingers and onto the floor. Derek does as he’s asked and passes the big roll of tissue to Stiles before tying off the condom and dropping it down on the desk. Clean up gives Stiles something else to focus on other than the awkward feeling that’s threatening to swallow him whole; he’s never had a sober one night stand before, would usually be passing out and falling asleep at this point with anyone else and he’s feeling more than a little uncertain about what he’s supposed to do now.

“I’ll –“ Derek says haltingly, “I’ll go put down the shutters. Meet you downstairs?”

“Sure,” Stiles nods as he zips up his pants and turns around to smile uneasily at Derek. “Sure. I need to finish up up here anyway.”

Derek nods and as Stiles watches, wraps the used condom up in blue roll and tosses it into the trash can under the desk before heading out of the booth, down the stairs towards the front of the building. Stiles is kind of grateful to be left alone for a minute while he tries to make sense of how he feels about what just happened. Of what happens next.

Once he’s pulled himself together, he shoves the handfuls of used blue tissue into the trash and grabs for his bag and hoodie before shutting off the lights and heading for the back stairs to wait for Derek.

**# #**

"Hey," Stiles says suddenly as Derek unlocks his car. "Hey, so, can I ask you something?" He catches the subtle lift of Derek's eyebrows, knows how oddly polite he sounds, especially given everything they've just done but needs to ask anyway.

"Sure."

"So, um, why?"

"Why what?" Derek asks, keeping his gaze fixed on the car.

" _You know_ , tonight. Everything. Why?"

"I like you," Derek replies with a shrug. "Isn't that obvious?"

"Only since you flung yourself at my dick," Stiles mutters. "Since when?"

"Does it matter?"

"To me it does, yeah."

"Since you started working here," Derek says quietly, digging his keys into the rubber window surround on his car. It’s a nice car; about a million times nicer than Stiles’ own rusting mess of a Jeep. Not for the first time he wonders why someone who can afford to drive a brand new Camaro is working at this dump. Derek obviously doesn’t need the money.

"OK, first off, I know that's not true" Stiles starts, folding his arms across his chest and leaning back against the hood of Derek's car. "You were with that girl when I started working here. The hot gym girl. So don't – shit, are you still with her? Have you made me, like, an accessory to cheating?"

"Braeden?" Derek asks grumpily, his nose wrinkling in what looks like annoyance. "No, I'm not with her anymore. We broke up over six months ago, OK? I'm not – I don't do shit like that."

"OK, OK. Sorry. I'm just – I'm still kinda confused here."

"About what? The fact that I like you?"

"Yes! Exactly! That and why now all of a sudden, I guess," Stiles replies, barely able to stop himself from yelling. He's had lots of daydreams and even more filthy fantasies about Derek telling him he's into him and none of them involved them angrily yelling each other in a dark parking lot.

"Because," Derek barks back. "Because you know how much I hated coming out to the bar with you guys and seeing you go home with someone different every time? Someone that wasn't me?"

Stiles doesn't reply to that, doesn't know how to. It's hardly his fault Derek never said anything. He just keeps kicking at a loose patch of gravel instead.

"And then I find out from Scott that you hooked up with my cousin," Derek continues, folding his arms defensively across his chest. "And –"

"Can I just make it super clear that I didn't _hook up_ with her?" Stiles interjects. "I just kissed her."

"Whatever," Derek says with a dismissive wave of his hand. "I couldn't keep doing that. And then Scott told me he could get you to stay late and I – I took the opportunity, I guess."

"Took the opportunity," Stiles repeats flatly, finally tearing his gaze away from the floor and looking at Derek. "So you pretty much think the same as everyone else, huh? Like I'm easy or something?"

"What? No! I just wanted to talk to you, alone. Even if it did mean sitting through a dumb penguin movie in order to do it. I didn't – it wasn't some nefarious plan to get in your pants."

"Really?"

"Yes, really. I'm not sorry though," Derek adds, shuffling his feet and looking away from Stiles. "About what we did."

"Me either," Stiles admits, a flush creeping hotly across his cheeks as he sneaks a glances at Derek. “Still kind of pissed at your sneaky little withholding the rubber trick though,” He adds, punching Derek playfully on the shoulder. “Real douchebag move.”

"I like the frustrated and gagging look on you," Derek says with a smirk, giving Stiles a gentle shove.

"Like I said, douchebag," Stiles laughs as he digs his cell out of his pocket and checks the time. "Not that I want to be all 'hey, fuck me and leave', but it's nearly three am and I've got another fucking open tomorrow so –" he gestures over his shoulder to where his Jeep is parked further across the lot.

"Same," Derek replies with a small sigh. He pulls his car door open and glances across at Stiles, the atmosphere between them growing suddenly awkward. "I'll see you then, I guess."

"Yeah," Stiles replies slowly, pushing away from Derek's car and fishing his own keys out of his pocket. "I mean you won't, ‘cause I'm upstairs tomorrow, or later, or whatever. But yeah. See you later, man."

He punches Derek lightly in the arm again as he passes because he isn’t really sure what else to do with his hands before ducking his head and hurriedly making towards his own car.

"Stiles?"

"What?"

When Derek doesn’t reply, he turns around to look at him, folding his arms defensively across his chest; Derek copies the move as Stiles watches him.

“Was this –” Derek starts slowly. “Are we – this wasn’t a onetime thing, right? You and me?”

“Hope not,” Stiles replies with a grin before turning on his heel and making for his car.

**# #**

He barely sleeps once he gets home, spends a good two hours tossing and turning which he intersperses with glaring at his phone. He probably should have taken a shower when he got in because he probably smells like sex and old lube, but because he's lazy, he had just peeled off his boxers and thrown on the first clean pair of pajama pants he could find.

Now he's alone his brain has gone into overtime picking apart every little thing that happened at work. What he really wants to do is text Derek, find out if he was being honest when he said he wanted more than a onetime thing, because no matter how much he reminds himself that Derek said that, his unhelpful brain keeps insisting he's wrong and that no one who looks like Derek would be that into him.

Feeling defeated, he sits up and snatches his phone from his bedside table, opening up his contacts and staring at Derek's name. He's had Derek's number in his cell for about nine months but has never actually text him; he can barely even remember the spurious reasons he asked for it in the first place. Something to do with Bukowski books, he thinks. It's 5:27am already and he's fairly certain Derek won't appreciate a barrage of texts questioning what exactly he meant in the parking lot. Instead he settles for staring at Derek's Facebook page. Not that that does much to make him feel better. It just reinforces how stupidly attractive Derek is which in turn reinforces Stiles' paranoia that Derek must have made a mistake.

And because he's a creep, he finds Braeden on Derek's friends list, because clearly Derek is the kind of weirdo who doesn't unfriend his exes and looks through _her_ page as well, needing to make sure what Derek said about them being broken up was true. If the pictures of her wrapped around some male model looking guy are anything to go by, they definitely have. That or they have a really, really open relationship. Despite the early hours paranoia, Stiles is fairly certain it’s the first thing.

The light is gradually starting to take on a grayish color as the first hints of dawn start creeping around the edges of his blinds, but even that doesn't stop him from going back to Derek's page and looking through his photos.

Which mean he eventually stumbles across a photo of Derek in what might just be the most hideous orange turtleneck sweater Stiles has ever seen. It’s 2015. Who wears turtlenecks in 2015? More importantly, who wears bright orange, chunky knit turtleneck sweaters in 2015? According to the caption on the photo, it’s from Thanksgiving which still doesn’t really make it acceptable in Stiles’ book. The absolute worst thing about the hideous orange sweater is that Stiles would absolutely jump Derek’s bones if he walked into the theater tomorrow wearing the damn thing.

Checking the time one more time and sighing to himself when he sees it’s gone seven o clock, he pushes himself up and out of bed, throwing his cell down among the covers so he won’t be tempted to revert to being the most pathetic individual on the entire west coast.

Instead he heads downstairs to find some coffee because he’ll sure as hell need it to get him out of the house and through the next ten hours at work.

**# #**

It feels like he’s never even been home by the time he starts his shift later that morning and his eyes are still gritty with sleep as he makes a start on getting the kids club movies laced up. It’s a little weird at first, being in the booth and having to keep walking past the makeup table without his mind straying to the mental image of getting fucked over the damn thing. He’s almost grateful that Scott’s running late so he doesn’t have to explain why he’s blushing every time he looks towards the makeup bench.

By the time he’s got the three kids movies started up though and is half way through getting the 11am starts laced up, he’s significantly less grateful that Scott isn’t in yet and is about to call him up and bitch at him when he comes crashing through the door, hurling his bag in the direction of the makeup table and skidding to a halt besides Stiles.

“What needs doing?” He pants as he pulls on his baseball cap. “Which kids movies still need doing?”

“None of them,” Stiles tells him, clapping him on the shoulder as he passes. “I did it already. All started on time and everything.”

“What?” Scott frowns as he follows Stiles down the booth. “Even Happy Feet?”

“Yeah, of course even Happy Feet. Hell, all the next shows are ready to go. Why wouldn’t I have the kid’s ones done?”

“Please tell me you’re kidding,” Scott says seriously, grabbing hold of Stiles’ arm and spinning him around. “You haven’t seriously started up Happy Feet.”

“What is with you? Yes, I’ve started it. What’s the big deal?”

“No-o,” Scott protests as he lets go of Stiles, a horrified expression on his face. “Stiles! Did you even preview it last night?”

“ _Yes_. Which you should know because you apparently engineered that whole fucking situation to make me talk to Derek.”

“Yeah, talk to him,” Scott says heatedly, pushing Stiles to one side and crossing over to the white board listing what theater is playing what movie, his expression growing more panicky as he runs his pointer finger down the list. “You’re seriously telling me you didn’t notice?”

“Notice what? What are you talking about?”

“Remember those frames we kept? From The Hangover Three?”

A growing sense of trepidation forces Stiles to properly look over towards the makeup bench for the first time that morning and yep, the spot of wall where they usually tape up strips of film they’ve saved is sporting a suspiciously blank patch. He shoots Scott a horrified look and shakes his head in disbelief. “Tell me you didn’t.”

“I thought it would make you and Derek laugh!” Scott calls as he starts sprinting down the booth towards theater four’s projector. “So you’d have something to talk about!”

“Who are you? Tyler fucking Durden?” Stiles shouts, chasing after Scott. He’s not really sure why he’s running too. It only takes one person to shut off a projector. “Why would you do that?”

“Why didn’t you notice it?” Scott challenges as he hits the stop button on the side of the projector. “What the hell were you doing?”

“What the hell was I doing?” Stiles snaps back, pulling the radio off his belt and holding it out to Scott. “What the hell were you doing? You can tell them why we’re not showing it.”

He peers through the porthole as Scott radios down to the floor staff, making up some lie about a film burn; thankfully there’s only a handful of kids in the theater who’ll just have to watch something else instead. Something that doesn’t involve penguins and whatever the hell else Scott decided to splice into the movie.

“You really didn’t notice any of it?” Scott asks as he passes the radio back. “Not even when the guy comes out with the boobs?”

“No!”

“How the hell did you miss that?”

“We were, uh, distracted,” Stiles replies as he makes more of an effort than is really needed of clipping the radio back onto his belt and hoping Scott doesn’t notice that he’s blushing fiercely.

“Distracted,” Scott repeats. “Dude, how distracted do you have to be to not see that?”

“I don’t know. We were talking, OK, and not paying attention.”

“Oh my God,” Scott exclaims in exasperation as he grabs at Stiles to stop him from walking away. “You hooked up with him. Stiles! You were just supposed to talk to him!”

“We did talk,” Stiles huffs, shrugging Scott off him. “There was plenty of talking.”

“So are you going to ‘talk’ again?” Scott asks, making air quotes.

“I don’t know,” Stiles says again, his mood starting to sour. “He kind of implied that there could be more ‘talking’ on the cards but, I dunno, I just get this feeling that that won’t actually happen.”

“Why? Obviously he likes you.”

“Yeah but what if it was all a big mistake. What if he’d got hit on the head or something and was concussed and didn’t know what he was doing?”

“Hit on the head,” Scott parrots flatly. Stiles shrugs because, well, Derek might have gotten hit on his head. That’s a thing that happens to people.  “Go talk to him. Talk talk. Not ‘talk’.”

Stiles makes a noncommittal noise as he turns away from Scott and his stupid air quotes and heads back towards the makeup bench. What happened last night? He’s good at that. This whole morning after thing? Not so good. It’s not exactly uncharted territory for him but also isn’t particularly recently charted territory. One night stands and bar hook ups where it’s been made abundantly clear that it’s a onetime, one night, no strings thing have proven a whole lot easier. And like a foolish fool, he’s told all of that to Scott which is probably why he’s being tortured now. Because Scott’s a torturer. A hopelessly romantic torturer but a torturer never the less.

“He’s wearing his glasses,” Scott adds as he follows him, which is just cruel. Scott knows that Derek in glasses is his ultimate weakness. Top five things that make his crush on Derek approximately three hundred and fifty percent worse? Number one, the glasses. Number two, the long sleeve shirt with _fucking thumb holes_ he sometimes wears under his uniform when it's cold out. Number three, when he comes in wearing the saddest, most beat up pair of Chucks Stiles has ever seen. Before he can get around to deciding what number four and five are, Stiles is jerked out of his list making by Scott clicking his fingers right in front of his face.

“Did I lose you on the glasses thing?” Scott asks with a grin. “I did, didn’t I?”

“You’re not exactly helping,” Stiles huffs.

“Glasses,” Scott repeats in a singsong voice. Stiles ignores him and sits down heavily on one of the stools. He gives the makeup bench an experimental prod with his finger, surprised when it doesn’t wobble because honestly, last night, it felt like he and Derek were going to shake the damn thing free from the wall. There must be something in his expression that gives everything away to Scott because he screws up his face in distaste.

“Not here,” He groans. “Stiles, please tell me you didn’t bang him over the bench. People have to work here!” 

To Stiles’ immense relief, his cell chimes at that exact moment, giving him a thoroughly solid excuse to ignore Scott instead of being forced to admit that yes, maybe there was some bench adjacent banging. He’s not really sure who he’s expecting it to be as he extricates his phone from his pocket and Derek is definitely not at the top of the list of people it might be, but there it is, clear as day on the screen, a message from Derek.

"Shit!" Stiles exclaims, gaping down at his phone, which is continuing to resolutely display Derek’s name. "Shit, dude, it's Derek. What am I supposed to do?"

"Read it?" Scott suggests in the voice of someone talking to the terminally stupid.

"I can't," Stiles replies as he holds his phone out to Scott. "What if he's texting to tell me about how it was all a mistake? You read it for me, you can let me down gently."

Scott rolls his eyes but takes Stiles' cell anyway, his expression going serious as he scans the message.

"Oh."

"Oh?" Stiles parrots, "What oh? Why oh? He regrets it, doesn't he? Fuck! I knew it was too good to be true. People who look like Derek aren't into people who look like me. Fuck," he says again, for good measure.

"Calm down!" Scott laughs, his serious expression vanishing and a grin spreading across his face. "I'm just fucking with you. He wants to know of you want to go for break with him."

"What? Gimme that." Stiles snatches his phone back from Scott and pores over the message. And yep, there it is, Derek asking if he wants to take his break with him. “What do I do?” He asks looking from his cell to Scott. “What should I say to him?”

“Say yes, you moron. Isn’t this pretty much what you’ve wanted ever since you started working here?”

Stiles dithers for a few minutes, typing and deleting several replies that all make him sound like an idiot until eventually Scott snatches his phone from him and replies to Derek’s message for him.

“Dude, what the hell!”

“I’m helping you,” Scott tells him as Stiles tries to grab his phone back. “Because I can’t take another year of watching you moon over him. You’re meeting him on the back stairs in five minutes.” He gives Stiles back his phone and then hands him his jacket. “Only don’t, you know, _do anything_ with him until you guys have talked.”

“Stop making it sound so seedy,” Stiles grumbles as he shrugs on his jacket. “There’s nothing wrong with casual sex. What if we just want to be, to be, I dunno, fuck buddies or something?”

“But you don’t want to just be fuck buddies with him,” Scott says in an oddly gentle voice as he takes Stiles’ place sitting in front of the makeup bench. “Do you?”

Stiles shakes his head and wedges his hands in his pockets, because Scott’s approximately seven hundred percent right. He doesn’t just want to fool around with Derek, despite how fun last night had been. He wants to get to do all the other stuff too, like finding out if Derek's two sisters are as fun as they seem on Facebook. Or if his house really does look like something out of House Beautiful. Or getting to know what Derek looks like when he first wakes up. All those things.

"It'd be great if you could stop being right all the time," he tells Scott as he pulls on his jacket and discards his cap, ruffling his hair in a bid to look slightly less like reheated crap. "Or at least if you could stop looking so smug about it. It's a bad look on you."

Scott scoffs at him and gives him a playful shove in the direction of the back set of stairs.

“Hey, Stiles?”

Stiles pauses as he reaches the three steps down between the projectors for theaters five and six and turns to look back at Scott.

“Good luck.”

“Do I need it?”

Scott laughs quietly, before smiling and shaking his head. “Pretty sure you don’t dude.”

**# #**  
  
Derek's sitting on the stairs when Stiles finally makes it out of the booth and downstairs and doesn't look up as Stiles sits down beside him, their shoulders brushing. His head's swarming with questions he wants to ask Derek, questions like are you wearing your glasses because you know they make me extra hot for you or did you mean what you said last night and when are we going to do that again or even what the hell is with the orange thanksgiving sweater? He doesn't ask any of these things though and settles for bumping his elbow against Derek's and muttering a quiet "hey."

"Hi," Derek replies, his cheeks flushing as he leans back and peers at Stiles' neck. "Bite mark," he says simply, his cheeks growing redder as Stiles shoots him a confused look. Stiles laughs at that and it goes a long way to easing the awkward tension between them as he rubs at the mark on his neck.

"So about –"

"Can I ask you –"

"You first," Stiles grins shyly, glancing at Derek and then staring down at his sneakers.

"What are your top five words?"

"My top five what?"

"Words," Derek repeats. Which, OK, Stiles really wasn't expecting. He knows Derek can be kind of a language nerd, but it's still not the sort of question he usually gets asked as part of a morning after the night before routine. "You want to go get pizza?" He adds when Stiles doesn't say anything, his expression going serious.

"I – yeah, sure, I can do pizza," Stiles replies in confusion, watching Derek as he gets to his feet and clocks off, twirling his card between his finger and thumb while he waits for Stiles to do the same. "Not Dinos though," Stiles adds as he stands.

"Goes without saying."

They head out of the building and down the street in silence, Derek staring down at the cracked sidewalk while Stiles mulls over his question.

"Ok," he says after a few minutes of silence. "Number one, psychopomp."

Derek looks up, a pleasantly surprised expression on his face. That, if nothing else, makes Stiles want to keep talking.

"Number two, curmudgeon. Number three, viscosity. Number –"

He stops short, completely bewildered because Derek has just very casually grabbed hold of his hand and laced his fingers through Stiles' own, swinging their arms slightly. "Number four?" He prompts, giving Stiles' hand a small squeeze.

"Right, number four. Um. Number four, discombobulation. Number five, rigmarole."

"Those are some good words," Derek replies. "That’s good. I don't think I'd be able to date someone who didn't pick good words."

"You wanna date?" Stiles asks in surprise, coming to an abrupt halt in the middle of the sidewalk. "Date me?"

"Yes?" Derek replies, his voice doing that talking to an idiot thing. Peoples voices do that around stiles a lot, it seems. "I thought – I didn't – you didn't get that from last night?"

"No, I did," Stiles lies, twisting his arm slightly so he can get a better look at his and Derek's hands joined together. "I just, I kind of got home after and started thinking that maybe I'd imagined you saying about it being more than a onetime thing and – you know what? Doesn't matter."

"OK?"

"Pizza?" Stiles says with a grin, hoping to distract Derek before he starts blurting out all his paranoid thoughts. They continue on in silence for a little while, a much more companionable silence that before, while stiles tries to wrap his head around the _date_ aspect.

"Hey," he asks suddenly, dragging Derek to a halt again and stepping closer. "So if this is a date and we're dating now, does that mean I can do this?" He grabs hold of Derek's other hand, pulls him closer and leans in, giving him a fleeting kiss.

"Don't know," Derek murmurs in reply, a small smile playing across his lips. "I might not do that sort of thing on a first date."

"I've got it on good authority that you do."

"Do you? And whose authority is that?"

"Yours," stiles replies, moving closer to Derek and untangling his hands so he can grab onto Derek's hips. "Yours and you blowing me in four and your whole fucking me in the booth. Seems like pretty good authority."

"It does, doesn't it?" Derek's so close now his breath is warm on Stiles' cheek, and for a moment, as he stares into Derek's ridiculous eyes, Stiles forgets that he was trying to make a point.

"But if you don't want –" Stiles teases, getting rudely cut off when Derek curls his hand around the back of his head and pulls him in for another kiss, a whole lot less fleeting and a whole lot more filthy this time. By the time they break apart, they're both a little breathes and Derek's cheeks have taken on a delicious flush.

"We're supposed to be getting pizza," he reminds Stiles, trailing the tip of his nose down the side of Stiles' neck before pressing a kiss just above the collar of his shirt.

"Yeah, you're probably right," Stiles agrees, tilting his head back as Derek keeps kissing him. "But seeing how Scott was fifty five minutes late this morning, I figure I'm entitled to a long lunch."

“Jordan owes me a favor or two,” Derek concedes as he slides his hands into Stiles’ back pockets and squeezes his ass lightly. “No reason I have to hurry back.”

“No olives though,” Stiles tells him, punctuating the sentence with a light kiss. “I don’t do olives.”

Derek pouts at him for a moment, leaning back when Stiles moves to kiss him again. “No olives? I’ve changed my mind. This dating thing is a terrible idea.”

Stiles laughs. “As terrible as your extra ugly Thanksgiving sweater?”

“It’s a festive sweater,” Derek tells him as he pulls his hands out of Stiles’ pockets and pulls him into motion again. “And I’m not even going to ask why you were looking through Facebook photos from nearly a year ago.”

“I’m not even going to ask why you like olives,” Stiles counters.

“Guess I like weird stuff,” Derek replies playfully as he squeezes Stiles’ hand again. “Weird food, weird sweaters, weird people.”

Stiles snorts affrontedly at that. “You can tell me more about your horrible choices over a nice olive free pizza.”

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr](http://the-misfortune-teller.tumblr.com/).


End file.
